The rise of the intimate “bromance” as a new form of friendship has liberated young men from the stifling bigotries of homophobia, but it imperils young women who are increasingly regarded as little more than targets of sexual attraction, according to new sociological research.

The bromance may not be the progressive expression of enlightened masculinity, as it is sometimes described and portrayed in movies, said Adam White of the University of Bedfordshire in Britain.

Rather, it may be a regressive development, with especially worrying results for women. His research, based on interviews with male undergraduate students, concluded that men saw their female romantic partners as judgmental, and as “the primary regulators of their behaviour.” This led to a generalized disdain for women, and a view of romance in which men feel they are “constantly posturing and self-monitoring, not only to achieve desired heterosexual sex, but to prevent relationship destruction.”

A key theme of the bromance, on the other hand, was the freedom to express themselves without judgment, and to engage in emotional intimacy without fear.

The rise of the bromance “is very, very good for men,” White said. It offers young men the opportunity for, as the research found, “elevated emotional stability, enhanced emotional disclosure, social fulfilment and better conflict resolution, compared to the emotional lives they shared with girlfriends.”

âBeyond the need for sex, we found that for this cohort of men, bromances performed a very similar, and often superior function to romances.âGetty Images

“But it’s not necessarily benefiting women, and in fact it may well be disadvantaging them,” White said.

The new paper, in the journal Men and Masculinities, even suggests the bromance could become a widely accepted domestic arrangement. With sex so freely available without emotional attachments, through social media for example, and because bromances occupy such a privileged spot in young men’s lives, “the bromance could increasingly become recognized as a genuine lifestyle relationship; whereby two heterosexual men can live together and experience all the benefits of a traditional heterosexual relationship,” according to co-authors White, Stefan Robinson and Eric Anderson, of the universities of Winchester and Bedfordshire in the U.K.

“What happens in 50 years, say, if these bromantic relationships really take off and men decide, ‘Hang on, we really enjoy these. These are much better. We can gain more emotionality from it. We’re less regulated, we’re less policed,’” White said. “And therefore women actually just become the sexual fulfillers of men and nothing else. That’s the worrying aspect.”

The key historical context of the bromance is the recent decline in homophobia, the paper argues. “We contend that the male preference for emotionality between other men, rather than women, has come about due to a significant cultural shift in the structure of masculinity,” reads the paper.

It's like having a girlfriend, but then not a girlfriend

The paper notes that in the late 19th and early 20th century, men posed for photographs together in physically intimate ways, wrote “endearing” letters to each other, and even slept in the same beds in non-sexual contexts.

But the increasing social visibility of homosexuality let to a climate of hysteria and stigma. “To prove that we were not gay, we acted hyper masculine,” White said.

As a result, men began to distance themselves from each other emotionally. The paper quotes one scholar to the effect that men “have not known what it means to love and care for a friend without the shadow of some guilt and fear of peer ridicule.”

Women’s behaviour has also been socially policed and restricted, but women are traditionally freer to express a wider range of emotional behaviour, and they maintain friendships through “sharing emotions and disclosing secrets.”

But men shared almost nothing of their emotional life, and only knew they were friends if they participated in activities together, “like playing sports, drinking, fixing things, or gambling,” the paper argues.

“As times have changed, and we’ve seen homophobia decrease, and homosexuality become a more accepted notion within society, what we’ve noticed is people no longer need to do that,” Adam White said. “People no longer care about being thought gay, and therefore they can behave in a number of different ways… All sorts of things are now open up for men without them being thought to be a ’sissy’ or a ‘fag’ because nobody cares.”

The research, based on interviews with male undergraduate students, concluded that men saw their female romantic partners as judgmental, and as âthe primary regulators of their behaviour.âGetty Images

It was in this modern climate that the “bromance” emerged, first as a movie genre, a mix of the buddy movie and the romantic comedy. Jonah Hill, Seth Rogen, James Franco, and Michael Cera have all famously played the part.

“The cultural adoption of the bromance term represents an increased recognition that young men are permitted to have more diverse and homosocial masculine identities,” the paper reads.

Today, as White describes it, university residences are full of young men cuddling and expressing emotional intimacies. “Everybody’s doing it, and there’s not even a consideration that they might be gay,” he said.

The research was based on 30 interviews about the romantic and “bromantic” lives of male undergrads, each of whom had at least one bromance and one romance in the past year.

“We are basically like a couple,” one said of his male friend. “We get called like husband and wife all the time.”

“It’s like having a girlfriend, but then not a girlfriend,” said another.

“Beyond the need for sex, we found that for this cohort of men, bromances performed a very similar, and often superior function to romances,” it concluded.

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